Skip to main content

Science Writing

This May Term, I had the experience of taking a course called Writing Creatively About Science, taught by author Dava Sobel (Longitude, The Planets, Galileo's Daughter). We read and analyzed pieces ranging from New Yorker articles, nonfiction science books--like The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (which I recommend to everyone who likes science, human stories, social and legal issues, or a good read), self-selected science writing and science fiction, and science-themed poetry. We looked at content, writing style, grammar, craft, and ways different authors treated their topics. I think everyone came away with a clearer understanding of what "science writing" means.

My conclusion: if artists are so stereotypically fluid and flexible, like water, they should logically possess some of water's fascinating properties. For example, being able to fit to the shape of their container as well as being able to sprawl across the floor in an abstract blob. They should also be able to hold heat during the day and release it at night, regulating the temperature of their surroundings. They boil, evaporate, and rain again in a predictable cycle. They can be ice or clouds.

My point being: science writing shouldn't scare people--writers or readers. It's an art just like any other writing you might do in your life--just with more fact-checking involved. If anything, good science writing requires more artistic and technical skill than fiction, because anyone can dish out information. Good science writers, on the other hand, can explain that information without condescension, present their topic in a way that's relevant, and make you care about something you've never heard of before. Nonfiction writing is still, essentially, storytelling.

People seem to have this idea that science and math are rigid and inflexible, whereas fiction and literature explore the great questions of life. But in reality, science, math, and literature are all different ways of exploring the same great questions. Are you afraid of Shakespeare? Are you afraid of reading The Science Times? Cast aside your fears! Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, and hate leads to the Dark Side--a.k.a. a view of the world where you are hiding in a box with literature or science (whatever your preference), and everything outside of that box is feared and hated.

Sadly, that seems to be the trend in the modern world. Specialists specialize in ever-more-specific topics, and readers rarely venture outside their comfort zones. The "Renaissance (wo)man" is unkindly known as the "jack-of-all-trades," and the education system grooms kids for job slots that fit their tested personality and aptitude types.

What is your box? And how can you explore the world outside of it?

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow by Faïza Guène, a YA Book By A Young Author

Review time! Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow is a young adult novel by a young adult, so I was very interested to read it. There's also a #MuslimShelfSpace tag going around, and this review is a nod to that. The idea is that there's been a lot of stereotypes and anti-Muslim sentiment spread around, so buying and boosting books about and by Muslims can help educate people and break down harmful stereotypes.  The author is French with an Algerian background, and  Guène  wrote Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow when she was in her late teens. Although the novel is not autobiographical, she shares many things with its main character. Doria, like her creator, is the child of immigrants and lives in poor suburban housing projects.   Guène   wrote that she realized girls like herself weren't really represented in books, and felt that Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow was a way to tell the stories of people in the suburbs who are ignored by the elites of French literature. Plot: Life Sucks, Until...

Review: Hemlock Grove, ep. 1 and 2

Hello! I'm back from my blogging hiatus. I've been on a horror kick lately, and most recently, I watched the first two episodes of Netflix's Hemlock Grove. I'm a bit late to this series, but for what it's worth, here's my review. I have some...issues.  Pacing It's based on a novel, and you can tell. Once the show introduces something that might be interesting or lead to tension and conflict, it snatches it away like a precious plot-gem that it doesn't want you to see. There is way too much exposition and filler. The plot hangs together pretty well, but not much really happens. Case in point, it should not have taken two whole episodes to find out Main Character is a werewolf. Especially since everyone seems clued into this fact and accepts it as truth -- except the viewers. Then suddenly Rich Boy is asking if he can watch the transformation like it's understood that Poor Kid Main Character is a werewolf. No warning, no lead-up, nothing. ...

King Arthur Sucks.

I wrote a review of The Greenstone Grail by Amanda Hemingway , in which I applauded the book for being the first Arthurian adaptation I had read that I didn't despise. I mean, how could I? Despite the book's other problems, it had aliens riding motherfucking dragons!!! Aliens! Dragons! Parallel universes!  After reading my review, one of my friends asked me why I hate Arthurian legend so much.  Well.  Perhaps one of the reasons I liked The Greenstone Grail 's take on the Holy Grail myth was because it was so different.  Most Arthurian adaptations fall along the same lines. It's the same damn story told almost the same damn way all the time. But  The Greenstone Grail took place in modern times, borrowing from the Holy Grail and Arthurian myths without making it so central to the plot that there was no room for other stuff like imagination.  Say whatever else you want about this book ( and believe me, I did ), it had imagination. Its main character c...